Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Brand Suicide, Chaos, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Content, Context, Corona Virus, Crap Campaigns In History, Grand announcements, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Positioning, Presenting, Professionalism, Relevance, Resonance
I’m writing this post on the 28th May, so who the hell knows what’s happening a month from now. Actually I’m lying, as I have a pretty good suspicion about a few things, at least to do with me, so it will be interesting to see how wrong or right I am.
But I digress.
This is about the British Government’s communication strategy, specifically when they went to phase 2 of their COVID-19 strategy and launched these guidelines to help the British public deal with the pandemic.
As we all know by now, there was a lot of debate.
Some said they were clear.
Some said they were ambiguous.
And so rather than help the nation as a whole understand their situation and what was needed to help us move forward, they ended up igniting the nation in debate about wording, leaving people to interpret what the hell they wanted.
A conspiracy theorist may suggest this was done to stop people looking at the huge death toll that had happened due to Boris Johnson’s shambolic handling of COVID. A theory only made compelling by the way Johnson suddenly announced the UK was ‘re-opening’ mere hours after he had publicly backed his advisor, Dominic Cummings, for breaking the rules he had helped force upon the entire British public in an obvious attempt to distract the public’s attention. Made even worse by the fact Johnson had apparently almost died with COVID, so he knew first hand how dangerous it was and as such, should not back anyone who had the symptoms and then knowingly broke the rules. And as a final insult, the way he backed Cummings – suggesting it was what ‘all parents would do’ literally pissed on the faces of the parents and children who went through incredible hardship [from not seeing loved ones, to not attending loved ones funerals] to obey what was asked of them. An utter, disgusting way to behave.
But I digress. Again.
The point I want to make is that while all this argument was going on – specially around what ‘Stay Alert’ meant in practical terms, Vic Polkinghorne, @vicpolky on twitter, wrote a tweet that put the debate to rest.
They wrote:
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Note on clear/unclear communication (one area I do have some experience)
If some people find it unclear, it’s unclear.
If you find it clear and some people find it unclear, it’s unclear.
The responsibility for clarity of comms is with the communicator, not the recipient.
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That’s a good lesson for anyone in the communication industry.
An even better one for the British Government.
Now if only they were open to constructive criticism or gave a shit about anyone outside of their chummy little privileged gang.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Brand Suicide, Chaos, Comment, Queen
A couple of weeks ago, I came across this photo.
I still can’t quite get my head around it.
Yes, that’s Vanilla Ice and Benny Hill.
Together.
Two ‘entertainers’ who achieved far more than their talent should have allowed.
One trick, sub-standard ponies … though at least Benny Hill’s single was actually original, which is more than can be said for Vanilla’s Under Pressure Ice Ice Baby.
How?
Why?
WTF?
Sorry for ruining your weekend, but if I am going to be ruined by it, you’re coming with me.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Authenticity, Cannes, Chaos, Comment, Corona Virus, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Design, Differentiation, Digital, Emotion, Experience, Imagination, Innovation, Insight, Internet, Martin Weigel, Planners, Point Of View, Positioning, R/GA, Relevance, Resonance, WeigelCampbell
Last year, WARC made the terrible mistake of inviting me – and Martin, though he is never a mistake – to talk at their show at Cannes.
While our talk on chaos seemed to go down rather well, I was still amazed they invited us.
Well, me.
Amazingly, they still haven’t come to their senses, because last month they asked me to write something about how COVID-19 was affecting business. And while they wisely edited down what I’d written, you’d have think they would have learned their lesson by now.
But no.
And while I would love to say the reason I am posting it on here is because I feel it is a worthy read, the real reason is I am too tired to write a post today so this solves that ‘problem’ nicely.
I know this gives you no incentive to actually read it, but it does talk about Pornhub in it.
And penis shaped pasta.
And David Lee Roth.
Oh who am I kidding, you don’t even read the short posts.
Damnit.
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If You Think Change Only Happens When There’s A Global Pandemic, You’re Not Paying Close Enough Attention.
COVID COVID COVID. That’s all I’m hearing.
Of course I get it … it’s a terrible situation with ramifications that could fundamentally change the way we live, work and operate forever.
Hell, just a few weeks ago, the head of the Automobile Association, Edmund King, suggested the demand for travel – by road or rail – will reduce so dramatically [due to companies and employees recognising the ability to work from home] that the government may be better putting money into broadband instead of bolstering infrastructure.
That statement, if true, would have a seismic impact on an incredible amount of industries … from car manufacturing, train services, commercial leasing and banking to name but a few. And then, when you add in the expectation’s [some of] society is placing on the actions and behaviour of brands through websites like didtheyhelp.com, you see why some are saying the societal reset button has been pressed.
But I’m not going to write about that.
Not because I don’t believe it, but because everyone is writing about it.
My point is less dramatic. It’s simply that how we live, work and operate is always evolving, so if you only think it is happening now, you’ve been asleep at the wheel.
If You’re Not Moving Forwards, You’re Moving Backwards
I don’t want this to be a big piece for R/GA, but we’ve always loved playing to where culture is heading rather than where it is.
It’s part of the reason why we’ve continually reinvented ourselves as a company and why we’ve been able to fuse creativity with technology to either define the future normal or open the door for it to start establishing itself.
Some of these ideas required us to be ridiculously audacious – like when we created Fuel Band for NIKE to start changing the way everyday athletes train and develop or when we created one of the first digital banks – NEXT in Brazil – because we saw how the values and aspirations of 20-30 year olds were totally different to the products and services the established banks were offering.
And while those two are on a grand scale for liberating change, the reality is it doesn’t matter what the size of the project is, we always place huge value on exploring cultural and sub-cultural changes because pandemic or not, people are always evolving.
While I really didn’t want to talk about COVID-19, the fact is the biggest shifts occur when there is a crisis and it’s fair to say, that’s what’s going on now.
Put simply, crisis collapses time.
What could take decades to evolve can happen in years, months, weeks or minutes.
For example, after arguably centuries of being denied, women were finally recognised as societal equals* after people [read: men] saw the vital role they had played in the war effort of WW2.
[* acknowledging that women are still continually denied equality in so many aspects of life]
Of course, this shouldn’t be a surprise. Newton’s 3rd law, which states ‘for every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction’ has been around since 1686. But some had started to believe these shifts only occurred through technological revolution when the reality is cultural adversity is equally as powerful … and the reality is COVID-19 is creating some major changes of attitude and behaviour.
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At the time of writing …
35% of Britons are worried about their employment.
The average Londoner is saving over 2 hours per day of commuting time working from home.
The top 10 fastest growing products being bought on the internet right now are in the categories of healthy eating, medicine and gym equipment … though chips, popcorn and snack foods are also all experiencing triple digit growth.
64% of people believe their community is stronger now than pre-COVID-19 … with approx. 1/3 of people offering to help vulnerable neighbours.
Families are now spending approx. 16 hours awake together compared to a previous average of 2.5.
Google searches for ‘meditation’ has reached its highest level in history.
Visits to Pornhub.com has risen globally 11+%, with ‘corona virus’ searches in the site reaching 1.5 million on March 5th alone.
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These are all big shifts with major implications. And while I accept there is a chance things will return to the ‘old normal’ when the situation becomes a bit more stable – there are 3 things to remember:
1. The longer this goes on, the more likely these new attitudes and behaviours will become established and self-sustaining.
2. Not everyone’s situation is the same, including when isolation will end for them.
3. Even if things do return to the past for every single person, they will all continue on their individual journey of evolution … whether in attitude, behaviour, aspiration, ambition or a combination of all.
A New Value Of Money?
Once upon a time, the rock singer, David Lee Roth, said:
“Whoever said money doesn’t buy you happiness doesn’t know where to shop”.
While this may well have been the attitude for multiple generations, right now – across the entire World – the value of money is literally being re-written by society.
I’m not talking about what and where people want to spend their cash [though there are some fascinating facts emerging, such as Ann Summers – the adult romance company – revealing the shortage of pasta in supermarkets had led to them selling more of their ‘penis pasta’ in 1 week than they’d sold in all of 2019] … I’m talking about their relationship with it and, as a result, their relationship with their banks.
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At the time of writing …
55% of people are very or extremely worried about the national economy, with 35% very or extremely worried about their household financial position.
950,000 people have successfully applied for Universal Credit in 2 weeks.
In the UK, car sales for March 2020 have fallen 40%.
56% of Britons actively want to support local businesses over global business.
22% of Britons are already changing buying habits, especially for non-essential items.
And while on their own, these might not seem scary – even though they only represent the first 4 weeks of Corona impact in the UK – when you overlay it with some of the cultural narrative appearing on Mumsnet and Reddit …
“I don’t want to live in a city where I can’t afford a back garden”
“Why have investments when they go down when you need them most”
“Who thought I’d value a full fridge more than full wardrobe?”
“The government needs to see public services as an investment, not a cost”
… you start to realise the fundamental attitudinal changes that are starting to occur.
Of course, many of these shifts in attitudes regarding money may be being driven by their circumstances.
Maybe they can’t believe how quickly their financial situation has changed.
Maybe for the first time in their life, access to what they’ve always enjoyed faces obstacles.
Maybe the lack of human contact has highlighted how alone they are.
Maybe it’s seeing a business they built for years fall apart in days.
Maybe it’s not being able to leave their apartment and breathe fresh air for weeks.
Maybe it’s realising that how you live is becoming more important than what you have.
Maybe it’s realising this isn’t a matter of wealth or poverty… but life or death.
Whatever the reason, you start to think that just maybe some of the fundamental values, attitudes and behaviours entire industries have banked on – and actively fought to maintain – are starting to shift.
If that becomes reality, then not only are the ramifications going to be mind-blowing for business, it will mean Alvin Toffler – the futurist, writer and businessman – was right when he said the illiterate of the 21st won’t be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.
While I readily admit I have neither the brains, vocabulary – or even the looks – of Mr Toffler, I wholeheartedly subscribe to his belief that change is the only constant … which is why I thought I’d end this piece with 3 ways we help our clients be comfortable with the uncomfortable.
1. The Most Valuable Thing You Can Give Your Client Is Honesty
When we were helping create Next Bank in Brazil – part of Bradesco – we discovered nearly 70% of the target audience would rather visit the dentist than go to a bank. No-one likes to hear they’re not liked, but knowing what people really thought of them allowed us to make decisions that could drive the biggest impact and value. In simple terms, it meant everyone was behind creating a bank that didn’t act or operate like a typical bank.
2. The Culture Of The Category Tells You The Direction Of The Category
We spend a huge amount of time understanding the culture around a category. Not just in terms of how people transact or interact … but how they live, act, talk and behave. From the music they love to the hashtags they use. For example, with NIKE Girlstalk, we use interviews, social listening and data to understand how athletes are talking about sport … because often shifts in language indicate changes in how they see or play sport. Some may not think this is important, but it’s the difference between talking athlete to athlete or brand to customer.
3. Use Technology To Be More Human, Not More Automated
We believe customer experience builds and defines brands. It’s why we look at technology as much more than a tool to drive efficiency and optimisation … but something that can engage audiences emotionally and distinctly. For example, COVID-19 is revealing a multitude of ways people are using tech to feel connected to others … from Zoom background hysteria to virtual pub quizzes to mega concerts on Fortnite. All of this shows the multitude of ways society plays with tech to provide them with emotional – not just functional – fulfilment, which should remind brands their customers need more than just, ‘category best practice’ digital efficiency.
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Sources:
The Daily Mail, 6 April, 2020
Dynata: Global Trends Report, COVID-19 Edition
Office For National Statistics
Stackline Retail Intelligence
OnePoll on behalf of ChannelMum.com Survey
Prof Jacqui Gabb of the Open University
Google Analytics
Pornhub.com Corona Virus Data
Dynata: Global Trends Report, COVID-19 Edition
The Guardian Newspaper April 1, 2020
Reuters, April 6, 2020
Hall & Partners
Dynata: Global Trends Report, COVID-19 Edition
Topics of conversation on Mumsnet/Reddit during March 2020
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Brand Suicide, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Corporate Gaslighting, Culture, Cunning, Equality, Experience, Fake Attitude, Honesty, Insight, Loyalty, Management, Perspective, Point Of View, Prejudice, Social Divide, Social Media, Standards
I know what you’re thinking …
Or should I say, I know what you were hoping.
That hitting 50 and having 10 days off would make me re-evaluate what I’m doing?
That I’d start to value afternoon naps versus writing stupid blog posts.
Well, if I was smart, maybe that would be the case … but I’m not, so here I am.
To show my age has done nothing to extinguish my pain-in-the-ass spirit, I thought I’d post about a little project I have going on.
It kind of comes out of the Corporate Gaslighting work I’ve done and basically relates to what seems to be the skills, modern management values most.
Now there are plenty of very, very good leaders out there …
But, and this is only personal opinion, it seems there are far more bad.
Now I appreciate some will view what I’m doing and say the people I’m describing are not bad, they are simply ‘optimising’ their position. However, managers should achieve their success based on what they enable their people to achieve rather than trying to ensure the spotlight falls just on them … so because of that, I stand by my view.
What’s scary is these attitudes and behaviours are so common that someone thought – when I posted one on social media – that I was celebrating them rather than mocking them.
That scares the crap out of me.
But not as much as the idea employees are being trained – consciously and subconsciously – to do this to further their career.
But I would like your help …
What am I missing?
What are terrible management practices that are being sold as ‘sensible’.
For example, with the blame thrower at the top of this post, I added the following:
If you don’t own your mistakes, let someone else own it. #LessonsFromModernManagement
And for this …
… I added this ‘lesson’:
It’s more effective to manage up than manage your standards. #LessonsFromModernManagement
But what else is there?
I’ve got one regarding the benefits of doing whatever someone wants you to do as well as destroying others careers is it proves you were made for success … but as I really want to turn this into some sort of alternative management book type-of-thing, I need a ton of them.
I know they’re out there.
I know I can come up with a lot myself.
But if you have any suggestions, I would be so grateful.
It may help someone not become the sort of manager that appears on Corporate Gaslighting.
Or allow someone who is suffering from this sort of ‘leader’, to realise they’re not to blame.
So I hope you can help.
Over to you …
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Apple, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Comment, Content, Context, Craft, Creative Brief, Creativity, Culture, Design, Emotion, Experience, Imagination, Innocence, Innovation, Insight, Marketing, Music, Planning, Presenting, Professionalism, Relevance, Resonance, Standards, The Beatles, The Kennedys, The Kennedys Shanghai, Unexpected Relevance, Wieden+Kennedy
One of the things I love about this industry is our way of re-writing rules.
I don’t mean that in terms of post-rationalisation.
I don’t mean that in terms of rebellion.
I mean it in terms of letting creativity take us to new places.
That said, I think a lot of people forget this.
Clients and colleagues.
Specifically the one’s who encourage work to go where others have gone before.
Or where the brand has previously been.
Or just killing ideas before they’ve had a chance to start to evolve.
Of course I appreciate what we do has a lot of implications on our clients business.
That to get it wrong has serious ramifications.
But – and it’s a big but – doing the same thing over and over again doesn’t move you forward.
The opposite in fact.
They know this.
We know this.
And yet I hear words like ‘optimisation’ far more than I do ‘creativity’ these days.
Now I get it, you want to get every bit of value from something that you can, but our obsession with models and processes just limits our ability to invent and move forward.
Please don’t think I’m discounting the value of experience.
There’s a lot to be said for it.
But basing the future purely on what has happened in the past – specifically your individual past – is not experience, it’s blinkered.
Case in point.
Mouldy Whopper.
Here was a campaign that was attempting to do something differently. But rather than be curious about how it would be received, industry people – the same folks who are supposed to be pushing for creativity – were violently writing it off from the beginning. And when I pointed out that no one really knew what the campaign was trying to achieve – I copped it too.
Hell, I didn’t even like it very much, but I appreciated they were doing something different and evidence showed it was getting people to talk about preservatives in food – which was a positive for BK – so at the very least there were something positive in that. But then a senior industry person challenged me – said it was only people in the bubble of adland doing that – so when I proved he was wrong, he just disappeared. Happy to throw out personal opinion but not happy to be shown it was just his personal opinion. And that was my issue, we didn’t know how it would go. We had thoughts, we had opinions but we didn’t give it the time to see how it played out and apparently, it did pretty well by a whole range of metrics.
Of course, the great irony is that when you do have a brand that believes creativity can move things forward in unexpected ways, then you get accused of your job being easy.
I can’t tell you the amount of times people said to me, “it can’t be hard working on NIKE, they love being creative”.
Of course, the people who say this have never worked on NIKE and tend to be the first to criticise anything they think is ‘too creative’.
My god, when Da Da Ding came out, the wave of, “I don’t get it”, “it’s indulgent” was amazing.
But not as amazing as the fact that a lot of the abuse came from white men not based in India.
But I digress.
I love creativity.
I use that word specifically as I see it as being much bigger than advertising.
At least in terms of where the inspiration can come from and how it can be applied.
I am in awe when I see ideas taking shape. Things I never imagined coming together in the aim of changing something rather than just communicating it.
One of my greatest joys was running The Kennedys, because I saw that in possible its purest form.
From making takeaway coffee cups into dog frisbees to re=programming Street Fighter to represent the lessons they’d learnt over the previous year … was epic.
Sure, sometimes it was scary, frustrating and painful.
Sure, there were arguments, walk-outs and moods.
But as I wrote before, great work leaves scars and while that doesn’t mean it can’t be an exciting journey to be going on, it will have many twists and turns.
Or it will if you are pushing things enough.
And that’s what this post is about, because recently I read a story about John Kosh.
John was the creative director of Apple.
Not the tech company, but The Beatles.
John Lennon loved him and at 23, he found himself art directing the cover of their iconic album, Abbey Road.
What many people fail to realise is the band name was no where on the cover.
And while John had logic behind that decision, many in the industry thought differently.
Especially at their record company, EMI.
In fact, the only reason it ended up happening is that timing was so tight that it was allowed to slip through before anyone else could stop it.
Another example of chaos creating what order can’t.
What a story eh?
And before anyone starts saying I’m wrong …
I’m not saying the decision to remove the bands name from the cover made the album successful. This was The Beatles after all – the biggest, most successful band of all time – so it was always going to sell by the bucketload. However I am saying the decision to remove the bands name from the album cover helped make it iconic … which arguably, helped make it even more successful.
Not to mention make the zebra crossing on Abbey Road one of the busiest in the World.